School quality and grade completion by students are shown to be directly linked, leading to very different perspectives on educational policy in developing countries. Unique panel data on primary school age children in Egypt permit estimation of behavioral models of school leaving. Students...

The rise of civilizations involved the dual emergence of economies that could produce surplus (“prosperity”) and states that could protect surplus (“security”). But the joint achievement of security and prosperity had to escape a paradox: prosperity attracts predation, and higher...

We conduct a randomized experiment that generates exogenous variation in the access to foreign markets for rug producers in Egypt. Combined with detailed survey data, we causally identify the impact of exporting on firm performance. Treatment firms report 16-26 percent higher profits and exhibit...

During Egypt's Arab Spring, unprecedented popular mobilization and protests brought down Hosni Mubarak's government and ushered in an era of competition between three groups: elites associated with Mubarak's National Democratic Party (NDP), the military, and the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood....

The paper presents a dynamic portfolio model under currency inconvertibility which rationalizes the recent Egyptian experience of real exchange rate appreciation and currency diversification following the increase in oil exports and the partial financial liberalization that took place after...

This paper contains the basic statistical material upon which Effective Rates of Protection (ERPs), Domestic Resource Costs (DRCs), and crop acreage responses were calculated by the authors for their volume on Egypt in the NBER project Foreign Trade Regimes and Economic Development. This...

A general equilibrium model featuring multiple realistic sources of financial frictions is developed to study how different constraints interact in equilibrium. We highlight, distinguish, and evaluate their differential impacts and rich interactions. The economic impact of financial inclusion...

Randomized controlled trials are increasingly used to evaluate policies. How can we make these experiments as useful as possible for policy purposes? We argue greater use should be made of experiments that identify behavioral mechanisms that are central to clearly specified policy questions,...

I examine Ronald Coase's criticism of standard regulatory and tax policies to address environmental externalities. I elaborate some of Coase's key points and discuss opportunities for Coasean exchange as an alternative mitigation approach. Regulation, tax, and Coasean exchange, such as through...

We ask whether attitudes toward government play a causal role in the evasion of U.S. personal income taxes. We use individual-level survey data to demonstrate a link between sharing the party of the president and trust in the administration generally and opinions on taxation and spending policy,...